In Build 2016 highlights, we all heard that you can run “Bash on Ubuntu on Windows.” Sounds terrific, doesn't it!
Let’s understand how we could have historically/current times run Bash on Windows. Here are the options:
- Cygwin:
Linux-like environment for Windows making it possible to port software running on POSIX systems (such as Linux, BSD, and Unix systems) to Windows
- Use any Virtualization software and host Linux variant like Ubuntu, Fedora, Suse.
- To use application container like Docker to run Linux (I haven’t used this way yet, but a few of my friends do it).
This functionality will be added as part of this summer's Anniversary Update to Windows 10. Then we can think it as another option to run Bash on Windows. Right? Ok, hold on… there is more to it….
The difference in using this approach is that:
“This is not a VM. This is not cross-compiled tools. This is native.”
If I compare with the existing options then these are not native and work on top of Windows kernel/wrapper. With this new way, Ubuntu binaries will be provided and it’ll work in the same fashion like Linux. The speed, performance, and developer experience will be better.
Let’s wait and watch once it’s released.